Using the Four-Square Strategy to Define and Identify Poetic Terms

Overview

Featured Resources

From Theory to Practice

 

OVERVIEW

Poetry can seem intimidating to many students, but the four-square graphic organizer strategy gives students a tool they can use to explore and analyze any poem. In this lesson, students will learn the definitions of alliteration, assonance, simile, and rhyme. Using these definitions and a graphic organizer, they will search through a variety of poems for examples of each poetic element. Finally, students will use what they’ve learned to perform an in-depth reading of Mary Oliver’s poem “The Esquimos Have No Word For ‘War’” and participate in a variety of extension activities.

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FEATURED RESOURCES

Four-Square Graphic Organizer: Defining and Identifying Poetic Terms: Use this graphic organizer to help students identify alliteration, assonance, simile, and rhyme in any poem.

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FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE

Brunn, M. (2002). The four-square strategy. The Reading Teacher, 55, 522–525.

• The four-square strategy provides students with a visual representation of words and concepts in the form of a graphic or spatial organizer. The underlying function is to position several related terms, ideas, or concepts around one central element in a graphic or spatial organizer, then to help students understand the relationships that tie the various parts together.
  
  
• Use of graphic or spatial organizers aids in systematic note taking by focusing tightly on the main idea and subordinate concepts.
  
  
• Visual organization of new information helps students to remember, recall, and apply new knowledge to new situations.

 

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